Vocabulary Focus   

deterrent (n) a condition which makes it difficult for someone to do a particular act by threatening bad results if they do i

off on a tangent (idiom) to suddenly start talking about a
completely new topic

far-fetched (adj) unlikely to be true, and difficult to believe

deconstruction (n) the process of breaking something down into its smaller parts

Specialized Terms

shelf life (n)(包装食品的)货架期,保存限期 the length of time a package food or drug will last without deteriorating

 

Global ambitions

Cantu’s “edible surfaces” may offer the best opportunity for achieving his global ambitions. He believes that they could be used to feed people on long space missions, for military MREs (meals ready to eat), or even as a way to get long-lasting food to people in     1      . “My goal with this is to deliver food to the masses that are starving,” he says. “We give them something that’s healthy, that has an indefinite shelf life, and that is super cheap to produce.”

Inventive ideas

Although Cantu says he can deliver nutrients on the paper, he can’t yet create the feeling of fullness. But that is hardly a deterrent to someone who thinks as he does. “This is where we get into nanotechnology,” he says, warming up again. “If you have     2      , you could have time-release expanding cheese-cakes.” Paper cheesecakes that then expand to fill your stomach? Sure … but before you can explore the concept further, Cantu’s off on another tangent, an application for       3      that will help avoid identity theft.

“Okay, check this out: a whole stack of edible ATM cards. You slide [one] into the ATM slot, authenticate it (with a thumbprint and unique bar code) … and the flavor is your PIN.” When you’finished, you simply eat the card.

Far-fetched? Well, yes. But when it comes from the strange yet wonderful mind of Homaro Cantu, you can’t help but think: Why not?
After all, what Cantu’s ideas have in common are the combination of the     4      and the familiar; the deconstruction of a familiar food and its reconstruction in a totally different form.

Vocabulary Focus   

concoction (n) the result of making something, usually food, by adding several different parts together, often in a way that is not planned



Specialized Terms
 bonkers (adj) 疯狂的silly, stupid or crazy

parchment (n)羊皮纸a superior paper resembling sheepshin

syringe (n)注射器,洗涤器 a medical instrument used to inject or withdraw fluids
haute cuisine (n)高级烹饪术 an elaborate and skillful manner of preparing food (french)

polymer (n)聚合体

.
Fusion food
Consider a bizarre yet tasty combination of food and science, of high and low culture, of the comfortable and absurd.Case in point: Surf & Turf, which combines a Hawaiian sea bass with duck. Accompanying the dish is       1      depicting a sea that morphs into a sky. “And please eat the drawing” a server would say. “It’s flavored on the top like a bird and on the bottom like a sea.”
Creative, yes, but what Cantu calls creative other people call bonkers. Another meal offers      2    , a soy-based concoction withvegetable ink spread out to resemble a soft piece of parchment; synthetic champagne injected into your glass with a giant black medical syringe; and pancakes sizzling on a “griddle” frozen to -273 degrees Fahrenheit. Such were the offering when Moto opened in January 2004.

Diners’ delight
Eventually, the restaurant was discovered by food lovers who came to admire Cantu’s strange combination of playful experimentation, all-American flavor and haute cuisine. There is, for example, the Donut Soup, an elegant espresso cup containing a few ounces of    3    that tastes exactly like the inside of a Krispy Kreme doughnut, chemical aftertaste and all.


Cantu Designs
Cantu is expanding into a new business, Cantu Designs. He hopes to license such patent pending invention as his     4      , "Cator"the printer that creates "edible surfaces" such as paper flavored like cheesecake. Another invention is his polymer cooking box, which allows food to continue cooking even after it is removed from a heat source.

Vocabulary Focus 
   
reconstitute (v) to change food that has been dried back into its original form by adding water

push the envelope (idiom) to stretch the limits of what is normally done

propel (v) to cause someone to do something

gimmick (n) something which is not of real value that is used to attract people's interest temporarily, especially to make them buy something



Specialized Terms

fusion cooking (n. phr) 无国界料理a style of cooking that combines ingredients and techniques from different cuisines

Class IV laser (n. phr) 第4级激光a high-powered device that uses a laser beam for cutting, primarily used for surgery and research

liquid nitrogen (n. phr) 液态氮the liquid state of a gas that has no color or smell and is the main part of air

enfant terrible (n. phr) 顽童；特立独行的人 a person whose unconventional lifestyle, behavior or work is considered shocking by others (French)



 

A few clues reveal that Moto restaurant in Chicago is not your average fine-dining establishment. Start with the Class IV Iaser, normally used for     1       , on prominent display in the dining room. At Moto, it’s an important cooking tool. Then there’s the huge tank of industrial-use liquid nitrogen in the backyard, used to freeze things that are normally hot and to mold foods into wholly     2       .

In Japanese, “moto” has many meanings including “idea,” “taste” and “desire”; and resident chef Homaro Cantu, Jr. loves to challenge a diner’s       3      about how food should look, taste and feel. “He’s an inventor who accidentally ended up as a chef and is returning to being an inventor,” says Wylie Dufresne, chef-owner of WD-50, a New York restaurant known for     4       . “But his food is good and tasty.”

Method to his madness

Cantu’s quirky search for the unexpected—the desire to push the culinary envelope by combining flavors, textures and temperatures in previously unimagined ways—and his general irreverence for the accepted parameters of food and fine dining have suddenly propelled him into the role of the restaurant world’s enfant terrible. And it’s obvious that he is just getting started. “This isn’t just [a] gimmick,” he says. “There is a point to this.”

The point, for Cantu, is simple yet starkly ambitious: He wants to change the way the world thinks about food. This has barely progressed, he says, while everything else has advanced at warp speed.
“What is cooking? ‘Cooking’ is a loose term. It’s understanding energy or the lack thereof,” he says.

Vocabulary Focus   

beat around the bush (idiom) to avoid talking agout what is important

far and away (idiom) undoubtely

list (v) for a ship or boat to  learn to one side as a result of weighting shifting

scope sth. out (phr v)
to look carefully to see if something is interesting

Specialized Terms
 

salvaged (adj) 抢救下来的 saved from damage, destruction or loss

cutting -edge (adj) 先进的 very modern and with all the newest features

Take a cruise

The best way to see Gates’ place is by boat. Local tour-boat company Argosy Cruises’ lake Cruises depart daily from LakeUnion year-round; and from Kirkland from April through November. The     1         promise views of “the luxurious waterfront homes of Seattle’s rich and famous,” but there’s no beating around the bush. The motor right over to Gates’ house, then slowly motor right over to Gate’s house, then slowly motor past, about 100 yards offshore, while every gets a picture of what may be the most expensive home in the nation.

Form the outsides, the place looks like a    modern     2       . Inside is a mix of old and new-salvaged timbers from old industrial buildings and cutting-edge electronics. Electronic sensors carried by family or visitors can be programmed with personal preferences so that flat-panel screens display favorite art images depending on who is nearby. Lights adjust      3       .

 Microsoft doesn’t promote the boat tour but Argosy says it has approval from Gates. Less cooperative was Amazon. Com founder Jeff Bezos, who lives nearby but asked the company not to point out his home.

The Seattle cruise also passes the sleepless in Seattle houseboat and other      4      , but Gates’ house is far and away the most popular part of the tour.

“They’ll be interested, then they ‘ll really be interested when we go by Bill Gates’ house—the boat kind of lists to the left,” say tour guide Nikki Bradford.

“very impressive,” said Liu Zhaoxu, a 17-year-old from Beijing, after scoping out the Gates place from the tour boats’ deck.

Zhaoxu hopes to work at Microsoft someday. So does his mother, finance expert Rose Wang, who brought the family to Seattle when she came for a job interview at the company. They took the tour the day after her interview. “I don’t want to go home,” she said. “I just want to stay here”

Vocabulary Focus   

meander (v) to walk slowly without any clear direction

blowout (n) a large social occasion, usually with an abundance of food and drink

anonymous (adj) having no unusual  features







Specialized Terms

median (adj) 中间的 describing the value  which is the middle one in a set of values arranged in order size

Relax outdoors

It’s not encouraged by the company, but visitors can also explore campus walking trails that meander through clusters of trees between the     1      .

 At the center of campus are large fields where employees may play soccer, Frisbee or softball on nice days, or have       2       or outdoor meetings.

Sometimes the company uses the field for blowout events, like product launches. Once, a pair of  decorated helicopters landed on the field to deliver the first copies of Windows XP to computer manufacturers.

Explore the neighborhood

After touring the Microsoft campus, tourists can venture up to the “gold coast” communities of m edina , Hunts Points and Yarrow Bay where Gates, chief executive Steve Ballmer and other billionaires lives in mansions along lake Washington. Homes here have a median price of around $860,000

The most expensive one of all is Gates’ mansion off 73^rd Avenue Northeast in m edina . Built in 1977, the Northwest architectural showpiece is actually a cluster of wood, glass and steel structures with around 40,000 square feet of living space, spread over 5 acres. It has a garage for about 30 cars, a salmon-spawning stream and room for Gates to host more than 100 dinner guests-chief      3      , world leaders or his three children’s classmates all at once.

Don’t expect to see much form the street. The place is surrounded by dense trees and shrubbery so all you can see from the road is driveway with an anonymous, but tasteful, wood and metal gate.

And beware that while you’re checking out the billionaires’ driveways, their security guards are checking you out through       4        . If you stop for long they’ll appear and ask you to move on.

Vocabulary Focus   
centerpiece (n) the most important feature of something

overhaul (v) to improve something so that every part of it works properly

trove (n) a storage place that is full of valuable things

beeline (v) to go directly towards someone or something


Specialized Terms
kitschy(adj)  庸俗的 describing artistic, decorative design styles considered by many people to be ugly, lacking in style, or false, but enjoyed by other people, often because they are funny

console (n)  控制器 a surface on which you find the controls for a piece of electrical equipment or a machine

paraphernalia (n) 相关物品 all the objects needed for or connected with a particular activity


 

There are several ways that tourists and locals alike can visit Microsoft, officially and unofficially, for a glimpse of the world’s largest software factory.

The unofficial tour of Microsoft’s Redmond , Washington ,        1       has long consisted of asking friends or family who work there for a peek inside. Now, with Seattle ’s biggest and most famous local company having passed its 30^th year of business, the official        2      have gotten better.

A centerpiece of the tour should be the company visitor center, which is pretty much the only place on campus open to      3        . The free center draws tens of thousands of visitor a year.

Experience their world

During 2004, the visitor center’s manager, John Cirone, completely overhauled the visitor center. It reopened the following January with an entirely new look, with more        4        from the company trove and handsome exhibits that showcase the company’s products.

Visitor may sign in to get their photo taken for a temporary “smart card” like the ones that employees use to enter buildings and log on to their PCs. The cards        5           animated displays inside, in some cases displaying visitors’ faces. The centerpiece is a time line that illustrates Microsoft’s history with a collection of artifacts and kitschy pop-culture materials from the 1970s to the present.

Teens can bypass the educational stuff and beeline to the back, where a spaceship-like room is packed with Xbox video consoles and a thumping, surround-sound stereo setup.

Other exhibits let visitor film themselves in a digital movie or make a free call anywhere in the United States with a Microsoft-developed mobile phone.

Upstairs from the visitor center is the relatively famous company store. Visitor can shop there and buy paraphernalia such as Microsoft shirts and cups.

“Mompreneurs” Juggle Work and Family (1/2)
More and more moms are running their own companies while raising their children---all from home

Vocabulary Focus
 

Juggle (v) to succeed in arranging your life so that you have time to involve yourself in two or more different activities

Confer (v) to exchange ideas on a particular subject, often in order to reach a decision on what action to take

Fuel (v) to increase or strengthen a feeling, type of behavior or something else  

Explode (v) to increase very quickly

Field (v) to answer questions, or respond to something such as requests, especially in a formal situation

Set up shop (idiom) to establish a business

Specialized Terms
apparel (n)--- 服装；成衣 clothing of a particular type, especially as it is displayed for sale in a shop

Xbox (n)--- Xbox 电视游戏机 a video game console crated by Microsoft and released in 2001 in North America

PDA (n)--- 个人数字助理，掌上电脑 abbreviation for personal digital assistant, a small computer that you can carry with you

Amie Trovada-Pavone laughs at the puzzled look on her neighbors’ faces when they stop by her home and she tells them she doesn’t have time to go out for lunch.
“They don’t realize I work at home,” she says. As the 35-year-old owner of PromoWorx, a successful promotional marketing firm and apparel manufacturer, her day starts at 7a.m. when she prepares breakfast for her three kids while making business calls to China.
The juggling continues all day---she    1       designs while the kids eat in the kitchen: she uses the computer while the kids play on the Xbox;and she confers via her PDA during her daughter’s       2      class. Trovada-Pavone doesn’t mind all the multitasking because she gets to spend time with her children.


“Mom-managed” businesses

She is part of a growing trend of “mompreneurs,” or women who stay at home running a company while raising their children. Fueled in part by the Internet, a more       3        female work force and child-care issues, mom-managed businesses seem to have exploded in the last five years.

A mom running a business is      4       , says Ellen Parlapiano, the New York-based co-author of Mompreneurs: A Mother’s Step-by-Step Guide to Work-at-Home Success. “If you think about it, running a business is a lot like running a family,“ says Parlapiano, who fields as many as 40,000 requests a month from women looking for tips. “You have to be organized and patient and disciplined and juggle a lot of [tasks] at once. Mothers do this every day.”

Some women had successful careers before having children, so it’s no wonder that more of them are setting up shop at home. “Women today have the skills, the education and the experience in the workplace,” Parlapiano says.

The Upside of Cancer (2/2)
A common health problem can provide a more positive outlook on life

Vocabulary Focus
outlook (n)--- a person’s way of understanding and thinking about something
malignant (adj)--- describing a diseased growth that is likely to get uncontrollably worse and lead to death
veteran (n)--- a person who has had a lot of experience in a particular activity
quality assurance (n phr)--- a system for monitoring and evaluating the various aspects of a project, service or facility to ensure that standards of quality are being met

Specialized Terms
leukemia (n)--- 血癌；白血病 a serious disease in which the body produces too many white blood cells
chemotherapy (n)--- 化学治疗 the treatment of diseases using chemicals

Giving back
The new survey found that 69 percent of respondents ages 18 to 49 years said having cancer had changed their outlook.

“It’s part of the     1       to give back,” says Gigi McMillan, who started a support group after her son developed a malignant brain tumor. Families “come to us for healing. Then they become       2      who help the next family.”

For cancer survivors and their loved ones, volunteering is about more than good deeds, McMillan says. Her group, the We Can Pediatric Brain Tumor Network, matches the families of newly       3        children with “veterans” who have been through treatment. Many use volunteer work to transform their traumatic experiences with cancer into something positive. “They’re helpless against the disease,” says McMillan, “but they can help other people.”

Attitude adjustments

Though research shows that      4          are no more likely to survive than pessimists, a hopeful attitude can improve quality of life, says Vicki Kennedy, vice president of quality assurance and programs at The Wellness Community, which offers support for cancer patients and caregivers.

Andrew Colletti of Springfield, Virginia, who was diagnosed with aggressive leukemia five years ago, says he wondered whether to even pursue the recommended treatment: chemotherapy followed by a bone-marrow transplant, one of       5       treatments in all of medicine. He did, and it left Colletti, 45, unable to father children.

Yet Clletti now says that cancer, in some ways, has been a blessing. He and his wife, Susan, adopted a baby two years ago. He says he now can’t imagine life without daughter Charlotte. “If I had known this little girl was waiting for us on the other side of treatment, I wouldn’t have had a doubt.”